


Slow Hands

by eleventy7



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Friendship/Love, Hogwarts Eighth Year, M/M, Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-09-22
Updated: 2008-09-22
Packaged: 2018-03-01 15:37:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2778494
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eleventy7/pseuds/eleventy7
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Blood, shadows, and paper hearts. The Shadow hunts students, but Draco Malfoy most of all.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Slow Hands

They came back.

To finish their education, some said. To see everyone and everything for one last year, others said. To see if everyone was alright, still more claimed. Some came back because they were nosy. Some came back in the hope that they would just pick up their old lives again.

Draco Malfoy came back because he’d been ordered to.

“Lucius would have wanted it,” his mother said as they made their way to the platform. A tremor hid in her voice, but when she spoke of his education she did so firmly, for once her eyes direct. “You must continue to learn. You must finish your schooling.”

 _He’s not dead,_ Draco wanted to say. _Please don’t cry. We can go and visit him…we can still be happy…_

She had sold their manor. Too many memories, she said. Draco understood. He couldn’t enter the drawing room without gagging.

“Things are different now,” his mother had said.

Yes, things were different. _The Littlest Death Eater._ The mocking nickname was passed around the streets and whispered gleefully as he went past. Faces tilted keenly towards him, all looking at him and giggling behind their hands. He could see the challenge in their eyes. _Go on, tell us to shut up, call us Mudbloods…_

But he was smarter now. He would not bite.

“Draco, please pay attention.”

He snapped around, distracted by the sight of the students scuttling away and sneering over their shoulders at him.

“I’m sorry, I - ”

“Ignore them," Narcissa said, smiling, but it was a thin smile that trembled and slipped. "Focus on your education. People...people will forget..."

The lie hung in the air between them like a heavy heart.

Or a corpse, gently swaying over the drawing room table...

"I'll — I'll see you at Christmas," Draco said quickly.They paused just before the wall leading to Platform 9¾ and Narcissa embraced him briefly.

"You'll have a good year," she said. "I know it. All your friends, darling, and all your classes..."

 _All my friends._ He tried to smile for her. "I'll write letters."

She nodded. He turned and strode through the wall.

* * *

“This feels — refreshing.” Hermione was smiling, pushing her hair behind her ears; Ron was playing a game of chess against Luna. “Harry, doesn’t it feel different?”

“Yes,” Harry said quietly. “Yeah, it does.” It was true. He’d had time over summer to mourn, to feel the losses — though he had told nobody about the Resurrection Stone, he thought about it all the time. Sirius, his parents, rising up and telling him _we’ll always be right here with you_ and that he, too, had known what they had gone through. Death…so quick and easy… _easier than falling asleep_ …Their deaths, so painless and without unhappiness. And this year — his final year! — without anything. His scar, gone. His nightmares, vanquished. His enemy dead, his ranks broken. No more fear, hurt, worry. Nothing.

People still followed him around, still stared and whispered, but people had always done that. He didn’t know why they had to be in so much awe all the time. All he’d done really, when it came down to it, was pretend to be dead. He didn’t see where that ranked in the list of top heroics, and (thank Merlin) Hermione and Ron saw this too (or at least, pretended to). In any case, he appreciated them more than ever.

“I know it's strange, but this feels a little like first year,” Harry said. Like it was their first trip on the train all over again...

“Except we’re a bit taller,” Ron pointed out.

“I made my move.”

“What? When? Where?” Ron stared down at the chessboard whilst Luna smiled serenely at him.

“Alright, Neville?” Harry moved over as Neville entered the compartment, having chatted to Professor McGonagall about his Head Boy duties.

“Alright. They keep following me,” he groaned, but Harry thought he detected a note of delight in his voice. Several beady eyes appeared in the crack between the doorframe and the door. Neville shut it pointedly and they heard soft sighs from the other side.

“Admirers, Nev?”

“You could say that,” he admitted. It wasn’t hard to see why; Neville had grown a lot since the clumsy boy who had first stumbled nervously into Hogwarts.

“Where’s your cactus?”

“Gran said I was developing an unhealthy relationship with it and it was to stay at home.”

A short silence fell over the compartment; they were all too scared to ask. Except, of course, Luna.

“Why, what do you do with it?”

“Oh, you know. Chat to it, play music for it, that kind of thing. Helps it grow.”

“Oh.” Everyone breathed again.

“I told her not to forget to water it once a month, and not to forget to tell it how good it’s looking. It has self esteem issues.” Neville shuffled a pack of cards, dropping a few. “So it should be alright.” He dropped a few more. He may have saved the world with Harry, but he still managed to trip on his robes every now and again, knock over an inkwell when he wasn’t concentrating.

Harry found this strangely reassuring.

“So, what are you going to do this year, Harry?”

“Learn,” said Harry, and smiled.

* * *

“Welcome back.”

Professor McGonagall sat down again; apparently, that was the extent of her welcome speech. After a pause the students began to eat, the noise rising again.

“How’s George?” Hermione murmured uncertainly to Ron.

“Alright,” he said heavily. “I miss Fred every day but…George will always miss him more, I think. It’s like he’s missing part of himself, too, part of his mind, like he’s forgotten who he is.”

“He’ll get better,” Hermione said. “He has to.”

“Yeah…” Ron smiled sadly. “He’s asked if I’d fill Fred’s shoes. You know. Become a business partner with the shop.”

Harry wasn’t sure exactly what reaction would be appropriate and so he settled for saying nothing, but watched Ron carefully. He had been so easy to read before the war; now, things were different. His brother’s death had changed him.

“I said yeah,” Ron said, allowing himself a happier smile. “It’s good, you know…for him to keep busy with things. For both of us. Thinking of the future. I told him I’ve had to come back here though for my final year, so Lee Jordan’s stepped in temporarily. Just till I’ve finished my education, as Mum puts it.”

The war had been particularly hard on Molly too but she was grimly determined to fight her way out of the depression that Fred’s death brought. “Some people lost so much more,” she had said and Harry thought of Teddy Lupin crying out for parents that he would never see.

Everyone had lost something.

* * *

“Double potions on a Monday morning! I should have stayed with George at the shop,” moaned Ron.

“Don’t be silly. Slughorn’s still on, I see.”

“Course he is, why would they replace him?”

_So many people come and go…_

“Just hurry up, would you, or we’ll be late. To our first potions class!” added Hermione, and clearly this crime rated up there along with ‘playing Quidditch instead of studying’, ‘daydreaming in class’, and ‘writing in huge loopy letters to fill up the last four inches of a Charms essay’ (this hadn’t worked; Professor Flitwick had made Ron re-submit it).

“Alright, so, if I choke on my bacon whilst rushing to make first class on your orders…”

“I won’t feel guilty, no. Come on Ron, you can eat much faster than that. I’ve seen you.”

They finally left the Hall, making their way down to the dungeons and into the classroom.

“Quiet, please,” Slughorn said, and Harry could see the war written across his face. The words hidden in the wrinkles fanning across his forehead, the sag of his mouth, the duels and scars and deaths all written there clear as day.

“Today we are learning how to concoct the Panacis Potion," Slughorn began.

“Doesn’t that take ages?” Theo demanded. Harry glanced at him; he half-expected Draco to chime in too, sneering something derogatory about the lesson. But Draco was evidently engrossed in trying to read some graffiti someone had scrawled on his desk, nearly jumping when Slughorn resumed speaking again.

“Very true. It takes precisely six months to brew. It also has several rare ingredients in it and I will require an essay on each one. Only when you hand in the essay and receive a satisfactory remark will you be given the ingredient.”

Unnecessarily cruel, Harry thought, flipping open his _Advanced Potion-Making_. It was the last potion, right at the back.

“Is our whole grade marked on this one potion?” Hermione asked anxiously.

“No. You will also be given smaller tasks to complete. The Panacis has to be allowed to sit for several amounts of time; this allows for lessons to be put aside for other potions.” He paused, as if withholding a large treat, then grinned round. “I’ll be making the potion too, so you can compare your progress to mine.”

Everyone looked mildly relieved.

“Right, to work!” Slughorn said, and two hours later the students emerged, blinking slowly in the light.

“We didn’t even do any practice, just read all about the potion and its properties!” complained Ron bitterly.

“That’s the most important part, Ron,” Hermione said earnestly, but Harry wasn't convinced.

“Do I detect a note of unhappiness?” he asked her.

“Well…it’s such a fantastic potion, I wouldn’t mind getting stuck into it right away,” Hermione admitted and Ron raised his hands in victory.

Harry smiled. Yes; it definitely felt like there was an air of first-year drifting about them. New beginnings, old endings.

* * *

Behind them, Draco followed, keeping his eyes on the ground. Around him, the voices hissed. _Awww, it’s the littlest Death Eater! How cute! What were his duties? Kissing You-Know-Who’s robe hems, didn’t you know? I hope he joins his father! Yes, he deserves Azkaban, the little coward…I heard they’re thinking of putting him on trial! Ooh, I hope he gets the Dementor’s kiss!_

The Minister had actually come round in person. Narcissa had offered him a cup of tea. _No milk please,_ he had said and Draco wanted to laugh and tell him that where he was sitting, the Dark Lord once sat. The Dark Lord had sat there and all sorts of insidious curses and words had snaked from his mouth, like poison…and the Minister sat in that very chair now, smiling and saying “No milk, please.” Draco had the feeling he could have gone a bit mad but Narcissa had sold the manor and its memories before Draco could edge over that line.

And the Minister, Kingsley Shacklebolt, had told them that the days of the Fudge ministry were over (and Scrimgeour — but he had happened so quickly, people just tended to push him aside) and that this wasn’t the sort of government that went around locking up people and all that now. _We’re quite understanding of your position,_ he’d said, and then Narcissa had murmured something about Lucius that Draco couldn’t quite catch, and then she’d told him to leave the room.

“Yes — it might be best if you go, Draco,” Shacklebolt had said quietly, and Draco stormed from the room. He listened on the other side for ages but all he heard was indistinct voices and then his mother had ushered the Minister out politely and told Draco “Everything is alright now.” But it wasn’t, with these voices hissing at him, the faces melting into shadows…they sounded like snakes…

“What’s going on back there?” Ahead of Draco, Ron turned around with an interested look. His eyes skimmed automatically over Draco as though he couldn’t see him. “Looks like your fan club, Harry…”

Harry turned too and saw the faces.

“What are you lot looking at? Clear off, the lot of you!” he said irritably and the faces stared, then dispersed grudgingly.

“I was only kidding, I don’t think they were your fan club,” Ron said.

“Yeah, well, I don’t like large groups of people skulking around and hissing like that,” Harry said.

“I don’t like _small_ groups of people skulking around and hissing,” Ron said and it broke the tension. They laughed.

Draco walked easier.

* * *

They came again in the night, the dark shadows, their faces morphing, their voices low and accusatory. _Murderer. Murderer!_

He woke and splayed his hands flat against his mattress to stop them trembling.

 * * *

Harry woke at five a.m the next morning and realised this would probably be routine. At least he had no searing nightmares and glimpses into Voldemort’s mind. But he still remembered the cries and screams of it all, the desperate faces and lifeless bodies, and they were bad enough.

Ron’s bed was empty, just like yesterday. Sure enough he was in the common room, reading by the fire (which had by now settled into dull grey-red coals).

“Alright?”

Ron jumped slightly then turned to him and smiled. “Yeah. I’m alright.” He paused. “Couldn’t sleep much either?”

“No.” Harry sat in the armchair opposite him, reaching out and pulling a table with a few items on it between them. “Chess?”

“You know I’ll beat you.”

“I’d like to see you try.” Harry smiled and Ron grinned, grabbing the chess set as Harry cleared the table of the other things: exploding snap cards, chocolate frogs, a few items from Weasley’s Wizarding Wheezes. Things that belonged to another time, another world.

"How's Ginny?" Harry asked cautiously.

“She isn’t feeling too good,” Ron said quietly. But Ginny had been that way all summer, learning new spells and charms, throwing herself into the most difficult-looking books with a fierceness that scared even Hermione. They all knew why. Fred’s death had made her harder, bitter. She was convinced that if only she had known better spells or been quicker and stronger that somehow she could have saved him. She was colder now and distant. She didn’t talk much anymore.

Hermione came down about an hour later. “I thought I could hear voices,” she said.

“We couldn’t have possibly woken you up!” said Ron, looking astonished, although they had just had a rather raucous argument about whose turn it was.

“I’ve been reading since four. Budge up, Ron.” She squeezed next to him.

“Shall we go down to breakfast?” Harry suggested.

“I want to see you finish this game.”

“Ron’s beating me,” Harry said and Ron smiled happily, a most annoying I-told-you-so look on his face.

“Checkmate.”

“What!” Harry stared at the chessboard, trying to figure out where he had gone so terribly wrong.

“Breakfast!” Ron declared, leaving no room for argument, and they went down to the Great Hall, Harry and Ron still embroiled in an argument about one of Harry’s moves.

“Would you two stop bickering for a moment? It's far too early,” Hermione murmured as they walked on farther, coming to the Great Hall and settling down at their table.

Harry was in a particularly good mood. They were nearly the only ones in the Hall. The air was dark and quiet around them, the ceiling a clear canvas of stars above them.

“I can’t believe no one’s up this early…oh, there’s a few Hufflepuffs over there! Didn’t see them properly, in the dark,” Ron observed. There were three Hufflepuffs, all sleeping on their arms. Presumably they had meant to get in early for study or perhaps Quidditch practice, but had given up halfway through their breakfast.

“Yes, too late for candles, too early for daylight. And there’s someone at the Slytherin table,” Hermione commented. Harry looked up.

“Nott?”

“Malfoy, I think. Ron, don’t put your pumpkin juice on the edge like that.”

“What?” Ron moved; his elbow caught on the goblet and sent it tumbling. “Thanks a lot, Hermione!”

“Well, excuse me!”

“Well, if you hadn’t said anything — "

Harry laughed. The noise jolted the Hufflepuffs awake. One of them half-heartedly ate a spoonful of porridge, the others adjusting their textbooks to make better pillows. Draco was silent. As they ate and chattered however, the Hufflepuffs managed to rise and finish their breakfast. As they left, more students began to drift in until the Hall was roughly a quarter full.

Draco departed just ahead of Ron, Harry and Hermione; he turned left as they went straight ahead, returning to their bright tower before going to class. 

* * *

“A clean cauldron is the key to success,” Slughorn said briskly, strolling around the room and peering into various cauldrons. “Though a few specks of grime or dirt may not matter in minor potions, the Panacis demands a completely clean cauldron.”

“ _Scourgify!_ ” Theo’s spell shot into his cauldron.

“Very good, Mr Nott, but you missed the rim,” Slughorn pointed out and Theo glowered. “So, once you have ensured you have a clean and happy cauldron,” — he paused, bouncing on the balls of his feet, his great stomach bobbing with him — “you may begin with the first ingredient.”

Two hours later they emerged, already exhausted, from the dungeon.

“I think my arm’s going to drop off from all the stirring,” Ron moaned, poking it gingerly. “It’s completely dead.”

“Don’t be silly, Ron, you need to practise the Imperturbable Charm, and that requires a lot of wandwork,” Hermione said, and Ron groaned. As he cautiously hinted about using his time to laze around and ‘recover’ instead (much to Hermione’s firm objecting), Harry walked along silently, listening.

“There’s that noise again.”

Hermione and Ron halted. “What noise?”

“Like — whispering.”

They paused for a moment and then it became apparent. Draco Malfoy slunk around the corner, almost glued to a wall as if he wished it would swallow him. Behind him, a group of Ravenclaws and Gryffindors sniggered and whispered amongst them.

_The Littlest Death Eater —_

Harry caught the others’ eyes. Hermione had a tentative look on her face, Ron just looked confused.

“Not again!” Harry snapped and the whispering paused. He looked amongst the faces for familiar ones but found most of them to be around second or third year. Finally he noted an eighth year. “Zacharias — what’s going on?”

“Nothing,” retorted Zacharias mutinously but there was a silence. He shifted about, looked at some of the group for support, then seemed to feel inclined to fill the silence. “Just walking around, discussing stuff.” He paused. “You know. Death Eaters, that kind of stuff. Murderers.”

Draco inched longingly towards a small gap of corridor, looking caught between the two groups. Harry frowned at him before returning his attention to Zacharias.

“Well, as long as you quit doing it around me,” Harry snapped.

“It’s annoying, having a bunch of ickle second-years constantly muttering behind you,” Ron added unexpectedly. “So clear off.”

Zacharias twisted his mouth unpleasantly as though had just eaten a particularly sour Bertie Bott's bean, then turned on his heel and left. The other students followed and Draco fled the other way, looking furious as he went.

“Wonder what he’s so mad about?” Harry muttered, turning a corner.

“He’s mad at himself, I 'spect,” Ron said. “For being such a coward.”

“Ron,” Hermione said reprovingly.

“No, it’s true! He can’t even tell those tiny second years to leave off, he has to wait for somebody else to speak up for him — his worst enemy, in fact. He must really hate himself.”

“I suppose,” said Hermione, sounding slightly taken aback.

Harry considered Ron’s suggestion thoughtfully.

“You know,” he said, “I think you have a really valid point there.”

* * *

And yes, Ron was right. In an empty classroom, Draco wanted to seethe, to lash out, be angry, but it had all faded away to be replaced by this everlasting sadness, this guilt and misery.

The faceless shadows shifted restlessly in his mind and he stared at a dusty desktop for ten minutes, jolting suddenly as he realised this was McGonagall’s old classroom. There was a dark shadow across the wall and as he approached it he realised it was actually a long, dark smear of blood. No doubt a lone struggle had happened in here. Somebody had been injured or died (perhaps a stranger had stumbled across the body later, and carried it down to the Great Hall to join the rest), and as the wizards and witches came later to scrub the Hall clean, to restore the magnificent corridors and rooms, this one had somehow been overlooked.

 _“Scourgify,”_ he said, and wished it was always that easy.

* * *

The door was open.

The right door was always open for Harry.

Inside, Draco Malfoy was righting fallen desks and dusting them down. He found their chairs and placed them neatly behind each desk.

 _“Scourgify. Scourgify.”_ Here and there, tiny blood spatters dissolved across the wall, disappearing. He bent down and picked up a quill that was snapped in two and stared at it, evidently mesmerised. _“Reparo,”_ he murmured and the quill mended, the two halves coming together instantly. He set it down carefully upon a desk. He went over to another fallen desk, repairing a splintered chair with a wave of his wand. As he pulled the desk upright something clinked gently across its surface, then rolled across the floor with the smallest of noises.

Somebody’s wand.

Harry watched as Draco picked up the wand, his fingers trembling so badly that he dropped it again twice.

He was brave, or perhaps just rash. In fact, it was something Harry would do. He would not pause to pick up an abandoned wand, would not stop to think of the consequences.

“Harry?”

He jumped.

“Aren’t you supposed to be meeting Hermione in the library?” Ron looked at him curiously, clutching several textbooks.

“Yes,” Harry said quietly and they left.

* * *

“Are you alright?” Theo asked Draco one morning over breakfast.

“I can’t sleep,” Draco said truthfully. “The Shadow follows me.” The only word he could think of for it. _Shadow._

And Theo seems to know exactly what Draco was talking about. The word flew around the school. The Shadow. The Shadow, that followed students, that seeped into both work and play. Whilst they were studying, whilst they were sleeping, the Shadow would come and remind them of all they had lost.

But only Draco’s followed him around in a real form. The Shadow stalked not only his mind, but his body. It became solid, real, in the forms of those who had lost too much and needed to blame someone. The first years and second years, who had not been there, who had not suffered, but had heard stories. They followed him around, his personal shadows, whispering and pointing. 

Murderer.

_Murderer!_

_* * *_

Blood spattered across his face and he woke, his wand clutched in one hand, the wand of someone long gone in the other. He was shaking and pale but he dressed with weak and trembling fingers. When he ate breakfast, his spoon clinked gently against his bowl as his hands shook.

Harry sat on the edge of the Gryffindor table and Draco on the edge of the Slytherin one, a small stretch of cold stone and darkness between them.

* * *

“Can’t sleep again?” Ron was sympathetic as Harry appeared in the common room.

“No, actually. I just woke up early. Good sleep.”

“Me too. I forgot to take my potion last night. Maybe I don’t need it anymore,” Ron said doubtfully.

“Yeah. Besides, I like our early breakfasts.”

“Yeah, they’re good, hey? Some quiet before the day starts.” Ron paused. “Malfoy’s always there though. Bit of a downside,” he joked.

“His hands shake all the time,” Harry said quietly. “When I go down there alone, it’s all I hear in that empty silence. Just a spoon, clinking on a bowl.”

Ron thoughtfully moved his king across a square. “Maybe you should talk to him.”

“And this will stop his hands shaking?”

“No, but it will stop you wondering.”

“About what?” Harry sat in the armchair opposite Ron.

“About why his hands are shaking.”

Harry looked up at Ron for a long time.

“You’ve grown up a lot over summer,” he said finally.

“I think everyone has. Except Nott, he’s weedy as ever,” Ron said, and they laughed.

“Come down to breakfast, then?”

“Yeah, course.” They departed.

When they arrived at the Hall they sat down and Ron was silent. Harry knew he was listening for it too, that timid shaking. It sounded like a death rattle.

Next morning, Harry went to breakfast alone.

Ron refused to come with him.

* * *

Draco knew he trembled all the time. He stared down at his fingers, at his wrist, trying to still them with his mind alone. As though his thoughts would course through his blood, spill into tissue, spread into muscle, soothing them.

He watched his wrist shaking, hearing the spoon clink with each tiny movement.

A hand wandered over and took the spoon away from him.

He jumped.

He stared at Harry. He was still holding the spoon in an oddly absent-minded manner.

They stood there, two silhouettes outlined by the sun rising above them, until Harry left.

* * *

_Draco Malfoy Worshipped the Dark Lord!_

_Death Eaters Run In The Malfoy Family!_

_Draco Malfoy is a Murderer!_

The brightly flaming words shone on every wall. Somebody had proven to be wonderfully adept at the Flagrate Charm.

Draco had taken a Dreamless potion.

When he finally awoke, alone in his dormitory, and stumbled to breakfast the teachers had managed to remove most of it. But the damage was done and the students were snickering amongst themselves. As he walked into the Great Hall a wave of laughter and jeers greeted him.

“The Littlest Death Eater!”

“Hold on to your Muggleborns!”

“I heard he tortured someone to death...”

And he saw it in the dungeons when he came down to Potions early to escape the hissing. Foot-high letters slashed into the walls, the flames burning bright and unmissable.

_Draco Malfoy is a Murderer!_

The word was engraved into his body, he felt. Written across his skin, scrawled into his soul. _Murderer!_

 _“Scourgify.”_ The words vanished. Draco turned in a half-daze and watched as Harry lifted his wand and vanished the words again and again. But they were still blazing across the front of his mind. He turned to stumble out the door but Harry stopped him.

“Leaving already, Malfoy? I’m already beating you in the Panacis Potion then,” he called out and Draco returned to his seat.

“You will never beat me in Potions,” he said calmly, certain of this one fact of life, and Harry smiled.

* * *

Draco didn’t take another Dreamless potion after that and consequently he could be seen at six in the morning, sitting at the Ravenclaw table.

It was dark still and nobody was around. He wanted to sit there to see what it was like to be a Ravenclaw. The table felt different and he was right next to the staff tables now, close enough to see the engravings on the seats, the woodgrain in the table. If he glanced out the window he could see the lake stretching away. He was not used to windows. He settled down and had a piece of toast. Ravenclaws would eat toast.

Harry came in and without hesitation sat down at the Hufflepuff table as though he did so every day. Draco looked across at him and caught his eye for a moment. He felt an explanation was needed.

“I’ve never seen the lake from here,” he called across the hall.

“I’ve never seen Draco Malfoy from here,” came the reply.

* * *

The next morning Harry was sitting at the Ravenclaw table. Draco sat at the Hufflepuff table. They tried very hard not to look across at each other. Draco looked at what used to be Snape’s chair. Harry gazed across at the lake, watching the squid poke curiously at something.

Draco wanted this quietness to last forever. 

* * *

Draco wanted to prove that he wasn’t a coward.

He sat at the Gryffindor table.

Harry sat across from him.

“Do you feel brave?” he asked.

“Yes,” said Draco, and his hands were still.

* * *

Harry didn’t sit at the Slytherin table.

Draco was too scared to ask why, though in his heart he knew. Harry didn’t want to sit where murderers sat. He didn’t want to get too close.

* * *

He made a critical mistake with the Panacis potion. He felt like crying for the first time and it would be a bloody potion that did it. He wanted to smash his cauldron like a child. The saving grace was that at least Slughorn wasn’t around; he’d left to deal with some urgent student matter.

Harry came over and looked at the potion. Hermione poked it. Ron frowned. Theo puzzled. Even Ernie tried to figure out how to fix it.

Only three months in. Three months left to go. And he’d completely ruined everything, like usual. He knew he would not attend the next lesson.

They went into a huddle. Hermione came back and vanished it. He was ready to kill her.

“Leave them alone. It’s your fault,” Theo snapped, troubled over his own potion.

“I know.” The anger was gone. The Shadow took away any passion. 

* * *

Harry didn’t come to breakfast.

Draco didn’t see him all day. He wasn’t in Charms. His seat in Defence remained vacant.

Draco sat in it to see if he’d feel any different. He looked down and saw the words carved deep into the desk.

_The Littlest Death Eater._

He snapped his eyes back to the teacher in front, who looked familiar. Perhaps he saw him briefly in the Battle.

_Murd—_

He covered the letters with a bit of parchment. The Gryffindor across from him frowned and moved their wand again, trying to carve the letters in.

He jumped. The professor turned to him.

“Is there a problem —”

But Draco was already fleeing.

* * *

Harry was at breakfast the next day. He sat at the Slytherin table and Draco went to sit at the Ravenclaw table when Harry called out his name. Draco returned, sitting this time not across from Harry but next to him.

“I feel nervous, sitting here,” Harry said.

Draco had porridge. His hands were shaking again, and Harry gently took the spoon from his hands, moved the bowl away from him. He looked at the letters engraved into Draco’s left hand.

_Murderer._

Harry held up his own hand.

_I Must Not Tell Lies._

“Did you lie?” Draco said.

“Did you murder?” Harry asked.

* * *

They took him all aside, his teachers, one by one.

“You must try harder,” they said.

“You must practise.”

“You must hand homework in on time.”

“You must make a better effort.”

Slughorn was the last to take him aside.

“How do you expect to pass if you don’t even attend the classes?” he asked, frowning and looking at him expectantly.

I don’t, thought Draco. I don’t expect to pass.

* * *

_Dear Mother._

That line had waited at the top of his parchment for several days now. He hated lying. He dipped his quill and wrote.

* * *

Harry read it later. He’d seen Draco rushing along to the owlery between classes, seen the letter slip from his pocket.

_Dear Mother,_

_I am well. Yes, school is going very well. Sorry I haven’t replied earlier. Busy studying._

_Are you alright? Got anything planned for the holidays? Please don’t take me skiing again, I got very sunburnt last time (if you’ll recall) and still have not forgotten it. If you don’t feel like doing anything, that’s fine too. It’ll be nice just to be home for the holidays._

_Yes, my friends are taking care of me. Thank you for asking. Please make sure the house elves keep out of my room (they move things around too much) and that my wisteria is watered twice weekly._

_Love,_

_Draco._

But he’s failing, Harry thought. All his classes. He can’t concentrate. His friends don’t stop the nasty rumours, the whispering…

“Excuse me,” Draco said. “That’s mine, and it’s private.”

Harry glanced up. Draco had returned and though his face was flushed, he held out his hand demandingly. A flicker of courage seemed to leap hopefully through the air between them.

“What, is it a letter to your dad?” somebody muttered nearby and the laughter rose like flames.

“What, that nutter in Azkaban?” another piped up to more guffaws.

Draco dropped his hand, his eyes cast downwards, trying to push his way out of the crowd.

“Where do you think you’re going?” someone pushed him roughly.

“To go hunt the Mudbloods!” somebody called out, their voice relishing the word _Mudblood_ , like it was a sticky sweet, sticky like blood, and the jeers rose again. They were getting restless — all it would take now would for someone to reach for their wand —

“Professor McGonagall’s coming!” shouted Ron, and the crowd looked around nervously, dispersing, wandering their separate ways, brushing past Draco roughly and sending him stumbling against the stone wall.

Harry hesitated, then turned and walked away. 

* * *

When Draco reached his common room he waited for his hands to stop trembling, then tried to take out some homework.

The letter fell out. Harry must have shoved it back in his bag somehow.

He re-read it, then scrunched it up and threw it into the fire.

* * *

Draco Malfoy was melting like ice. Fading like a ghost. They could see him, his head bent low, creeping along the walls, not looking at anyone, hunched over as though trying to disappear into the stone beside him. He was too scared to lift his head, to look into somebody’s eyes, in case of what he saw.

He was a coward and he knew it.

The next morning he sat at the Gryffindor table again.

He was in that kind of mood today, when the day felt bright and new and he thought maybe he could be better.

* * *

Harry sat at the Slytherin table where Draco used to sit with Crabbe and Goyle flanking him. He didn’t know who sat there now, long after Draco had finished breakfast and retreated to examine his scars.

They had carved a reminder just in case Draco chose to sit there again. The head of a snake was engraved in the wood, its neck ending in torn flesh and sinew.

“What’s this mean?” he asked and Draco slowly got up from the Gryffindor table, walking over as though he expected a trap. When he was level with Harry he leaned over him, his breath ghosting across Harry’s cheek in the cold air.

“It means that Death Eaters are not welcome.”

“I thought Slytherins would have worshipped them.”

“But we failed. I failed. I could not be dark, and I could not be light.”

“No,” Harry said. “You couldn’t be dark.” He drew his wand across the graffiti as though rubbing it out and sure enough the words slowly evaporated. “Maybe you were meant to be light.”

Draco showed the first emotion for months, jerking away from Harry as if he’d been burnt. “I am _not_ light! I watched people die! I watch them get tortured, and I did _nothing!_ I stood and watched!”

“So did I.”

Draco was uncertain now, hesitant.

“You did?”

“Yes.”

The Shadow was upon them but at the same time, it wasn’t.

* * *

When Harry was walking out by the lake, Ron nudged him gently.

“What?”

“And Professor Flitwick had a look at my essay draft and said it was quite outstanding — what?” Hermione noticed their lack of attention.

It was just the three of them in the early morning. They had started off as three dark smudges in the snow, wandering round in their frozen blue and white world. Now it was lighter, the snow glowing a soft pinky-orange under the rising sun and they were sharply-defined silhouettes, walking back towards the castle.

“What is it?” Hermione asked more quietly.

“Someone is by the window,” Ron said.

“And this is of consequence because…?” Hermione asked but Harry looked. Yes, on the second floor, in a lonely and dusty classroom. His face was a blur, his hands against the window like pale butterflies flickering behind dusty glass.

Harry looked down at his own hands and placed them deep into his pockets.

* * *

In Potions, when Draco saw his cauldron full of potion, as though nothing had happened, he turned and stared at Harry.

“I gave you mine,” Slughorn said. “It’s alright. Just make sure it does not happen again, Mr Malfoy, or I’ll have to fail you.”

Draco tried to measure out dried Gnargle hearts. His hand shook and the next moment the hearts had scattered all over the floor.

He tried hard, so very hard, not to just give up and sink to the floor with them.

Somebody was gently tugging the measuring spoon from his hand.

“It’s alright,” Harry said, and then he bent down and started picking up the hearts. Theo leaned down and helped him, their hands brushing against each other, and then Ernie, and Hermione and Ron were there too, sweeping up the tiny hearts with clumsy fingers.

* * *

The Shadow came for him at night. These dark creatures on shadowed wings. They came for the weak, they came for the alone. And was he not both?

He woke with a name dying on his lips.

* * *

_I saw you at the window_ , Harry wanted to say. _I saw you by the lake. I saw you in that dusty classroom trying to pick up a wand. I saw you._

And even now he could see him sitting in the front of the classroom, asking Professor Slughorn about the healing properties of the Murtlap.

Harry was the one to go to Professor Slughorn.

“Draco isn't feeling well,” he said, and although Slughorn made a great show of saying 'hmm' and 'we'll see', he agreed to help. Harry dropped copious hints about how he considered Slughorn to be one of his favourite professors. Slughorn cheered up a lot after that and was a lot more amiable about giving Draco his Panacis potion.

Now, Harry tilted his head slightly, listening as Slughorn spoke quietly to Draco.

“...your essay is a day late. Again. Are you sure you’re ready for NEWT level potions?”

“Yes, sir,” Draco said, and Harry caught the crushing disappointment and doubt in his voice. 

* * *

“Talk to him.”

“Take him for a walk.”

“Have a fight.”

“Organise a study session in the library,” Hermione said brightly and they all groaned.

Harry did not ever imagine he would find himself in the Gryffindor common room discussing ways to cheer up Draco Malfoy.

“Just don’t say the words ‘Death Eater’, ‘Dad’, ‘ferret’, or ‘battle’ around him,” Seamus said, slapping a card down.

“Yes, because other people say it for us.”

“Tell them to leave him alone,” Dean said, sketching away with a piece of charcoal.

“Get him to do it himself,” Ron said and the pile of cards blew up in Harry’s face.

* * *

_Get him to do it himself._

Harry sat opposite Draco, who was presently sitting at the Slytherin table. He had learnt to tell Draco’s mood by which table he sat at. If he was feeling brave, he sat at the Gryffindor table. If he was feeling something new or different, he sat at the Hufflepuff table. When he felt lost, he sat at the Ravenclaw table. And when the Shadow came over him he returned to Slytherin.

He reached out and touched Draco’s wrist. Draco was holding his spoon; he clenched it suddenly, his hand flexing.

“Do you still have the wand you found?”

Draco stumbled away.

The Shadow would come for them again.

* * *

When he was walking down the corridor, they attacked him. Not with wands or fists but with words, which were worse.

_The Littlest Death Eater, the Littlest Death Eater..._

They chanted it in a light sing-song voice as though it was a bad joke or a silly fairytale. _Once upon a time there was Draco Malfoy._

And then, he thought, there was nothing. Just blood and shadows.

* * *

He saw a gun once, in his father's study. The only Muggle artefact his father owned.

“It is a gun,” his father said. “It is the Muggle Avada Kedavra. It will kill you.” And as if to prove it, he took it off the wall and shot at the head of a nearby sculpture, smashing it into a million pieces. Draco was expecting light, a burst of red, but there had been nothing. Just a loud noise and bits of stone around his feet.

That’s what he felt like sometimes. No fireworks or burst of light. No ceremony, no dramatics, no explosions or screams or warnings.

Just him lying on the ground with pieces of his life around him. 

* * *

At breakfast, Draco could not see Harry anywhere.

He walked forwards and then he saw him sitting in Snape’s old chair. Slughorn’s, now.

He sat in Dumbledore’s old chair and they looked at each other. He wondered if Harry ever got frightened. If his face ever turned grey with fear, if he ever stumbled, if his hands ever trembled.

Harry didn’t seem scared of anything though. He was Harry. Draco could not imagine him crying or sobbing into a little mess or curling up in a ball or holding a wand to his head and screaming that he was going to end it all. He was just Harry. He played Quidditch very well and handed in all his essays on time and had two best friends and was nice to people, even the really rude ones. Draco wanted to be like that. He wanted to smile at people or hand in his essays and have teachers smile at him or just get out of his stupid little mind. Sometimes it felt like he was suffocating sometimes. Like he was walking underwater, going nowhere, frozen in an Impedimenta curse. Moving towards something that he could never reach or at least could not reach in time.

He couldn’t look at Harry. 

* * *

That night he dreamed. In his father’s study, Harry took down the gun and came closer, closer, until it was level with Draco’s head. The study disappeared and now they were in a snowy field. Just him, Harry, and a gun between them. Draco stared down the barrel, the blackness...and then a thousand red hearts burst out of it, sailing away like leaves on the eve of winter, the chill breeze catching them and sending them tumbling across the sky, fading into the stars.

Draco woke up, his hand outstretched to catch a heart that did not exist.

* * *

Draco watched them again at five o’clock in the morning, circling the lake. Not talking. No need to talk. Harry skimmed rocks. Hermione drew patterns in the snow with her wand. Ron methodically melted the leaves, one by one, from a tall tree that had not managed to shed its leaves in time for winter. The icicles melted away to reveal the rich gold beneath.

Draco wanted summer again.

* * *

He sat in the room, alone in the dust and dark and shadows, when Harry slid into the chair next to him. Two students in an old classroom, sitting at two dusty desks next to each other. Through the window a long sliver of golden light broke the darkness, the sun rising to illuminate a glorious day.

And the two would not move.

* * *

“I’ve got something for you,” Harry said quietly as they sat the next morning opposite each other at the Ravenclaw table. It was a dark morning, the sun still asleep. There was a silver frost and the stars were still out, cold and fresh, and Draco felt more alive than he ever had.

“What is it?” he asked, coming closer to Harry, so close that he could feel the warmth of him.

Harry reached out and placed something on the table.

He recognised it immediately. His wand. Not the one in his hand now, that Ollivander had so grudgingly made him. No. His faithful wand that had been taken from him so many months ago.

“You have to take it,” Harry said, and Draco understood.

_“Expelliarmus.”_

The wand moved gently, rolling across the table and falling into his outstretched hand.

“I missed it,” Draco said.

 _…Red hearts, bursting upwards, skimming along the stars, weaving through the Milky Way, dancing across th_ e moon...

Draco tried to smile but didn’t quite manage it.

* * *

The first Hogsmeade visit came up.

It was a strange sort of day. It was a day when he could taste the darkness in the air, smell the thunderstorm rising through the air like a ghost. People were oddly raucous, noisy; their countenances strange blurs as wind-whipped hair shot across their faces like spells, their cloaks rising to greet the shadowed skies like strange wings. The Three Broomsticks’ sign swung and crashed loudly in the gale and a group standing nearby screamed and skittered like shying horses. At three o’clock in the afternoon it felt as though it was on the brink of nightfall. Yes, the whole day had a bruised, brooding feel to it.

Draco’s mother had a phrase for it. Fate’s Shadow, she called it. When it comes, she said — when you feel it in the air — stay in bed. Huddle down beneath warm covers, don’t go out until you feel it pass over you.

Draco always viewed it as superstition and although he felt it now, he pushed it aside. He did not think of himself as superstitious. He deliberately dawdled, looking through shop windows, pausing to stock up on sugar quills at Honeydukes — but in the end, he hurried back to Hogwarts before it was ‘too late’ — too late for what though, he could not say.

He went straight to the library, with vague study plans in mind (although he was without books, quills and parchment) but bumped straight into Harry. Harry took in his rain-spattered face, his wind-mangled robes.

“I felt the Shadow on me,” Draco said.

“Do you want to go to the Great Hall?” asked Harry. 

* * *

Once they were settled — Draco at the Hufflepuff table, Harry at Gryffindor — they sat on the closest benches to each other and Draco told Harry about his mother’s Fate’s Shadow theory.

“So it’s like Seeing?” Harry asked.

“No. It’s just like a feeling you get, a lurking in your stomach,” Draco said, frustrated at his inability to put it into words but Harry seemed to understand, nodding.

“But it feels alright now?”

“Yes.” Draco smiled in relief. Harry nodded and smiled, the first time he had done so directed at Draco. He stood up and left. Draco presumed Hermione had banished him to the library for missed homework.

Draco remained for a few minutes longer, rifling through his parcels from Hogsmeade and readjusting the weight. As he got up to leave, he realised his hands had not trembled once.

He left.

* * *

He could always find him in the Great Hall. At the Ravenclaw table, Draco guessed, but no. Harry was at the Gryffindor table. He had been there for three days now. Draco wondered if he would stay there now, always. But that had been Before the war, and everything was different now. Time always seemed to be marked by that now. It was either Before or After.

That was the problem. He had always been prepared for a Before, but never stopped to think about the After. In his mind, there was always a Before. In his head, there would be a war, and — and — nothing.

“What are you thinking?” Harry said, flicking a toast crust at him.

Draco was startled into telling him.

Harry paused, absently eating another crust that Draco suspected he had saved specifically for flicking purposes.

“My life,” Harry said, “was always in a state of war.” He paused, pushing his plate away. “I can’t imagine a Before, and an After was something that happened to other people.”

Yes, thought Draco. Something that happened to other people.

* * *

“Where do you go?”

Pansy asked the question, genuinely concerned. She never saw him at breakfast anymore. Theo said he was never in the dorm in the mornings.

Pansy couldn’t understand. Greg and Theo could. Their parents had been too deeply embroiled. Every act they did affected their children. Every action involved a reaction. It was like a spell rebounding. Pansy, little affected, still so sheltered, seemed to belong to a world that no longer existed, a time that no longer was.

_Where do you go, Draco?_

Away, he thought. I go away, where the Shadow cannot follow. 

* * *

They were out by the lake. Harry liked being with them. Hermione and Ron understood. He knew that in her dreams, Hermione screamed as Bellatrix raised her wand once more. And when Ron’s eyes glazed over with the Shadow darkening them, Harry knew he was remembering dueling for his life over the body of his lifeless brother. They understood. When he wanted quiet, when he wanted alone, they wanted it too. When he wanted to remember, so did they. They knew him. Evenings were reserved for them alone but tonight Harry was particularly moody, a darkness that made him silent and unresponsive. Hermione and Ron prescribed him a walk, unaccompanied, by the lake, where he could brew and brood through memories alone.

And as he finished, as he reeled in his memories like kites from a stormy sky, he noted the Hufflepuffs skimming rocks across the lake, pausing to pull their cloaks tight and return to the castle. A storm was coming. He decided to return to the castle himself, just as the heavens opened and the rain fell so hard and fast it felt like he was in the middle of a waterfall, walking through a thick sheet of water.

Walking underwater. 

* * *

Draco Malfoy had heard all sorts of stories about rain and how romantic it was. The dramatic rain, the sweet smell of wet earth, the tumultuous clouds; but he decided it was the opposite for the single person. He slipped and sloshed through the muddied ground, skidding down a slightly embankment and nearly landing on a surprised Harry.

He clutched onto him tightly as they nearly fell, slipping and putting back a hand to catch himself, feeling the wet earth cling to his palm as his other hand grabbed a handful of Harry’s robes again. He managed to haul himself upright with great effort. The two of them ran, stumbling, grimly holding their robes above their heads. The rain pelted their faces, soaking first the front of Draco’s open robes until his thighs were chilled to the bone, then stinging his hands till they burned with cold. He could not even feel his face anymore. It was nearly impossible to see with evening setting in over the storm but at last they were up the castle steps and inside. Harry shook his hair out of his eyes and departed immediately, setting off towards the Gryffindor tower without bothering for words of farewell.

Draco took longer to wander down to the Slytherin dungeons and when Theo saw him he smiled.

“What?” said Draco and Pansy, laughing, offered a small mirror.

Of course he was sodden, his hair plastered to his scalp, his robes most unhappily tangled. But his face — oh, his face! — was totally covered with mud. He looked as though someone had thrown a mud pie at him.

 _“Scourgify,”_ Draco said and wondered if it had made Harry smile later on, when he was alone.

* * *

In Potions he willed his hands to be still.

_Please, please. Be still._

He took a Gnargle heart.

_Be still._

Another.

_Steady._

One more.

_Strong._

Such a painful process. One heart at a time, held between tense fingertips.

_Still._

His heart shattered.

Slughorn looked up.

“Don’t hold them too tight, Mr Malfoy, or you’ll reduce them to powder.”

Draco got another heart, his fingertips coated with the fine dust of another.

_Still. Steady. Strong._

He would do this and he would make a perfect Panacis. He would pass Potions, if nothing else.

_Still. Steady. Strong._

* * *

Harry wasn’t at breakfast. Six a.m and Draco was alone.

Ron came in about half an hour later.

“Harry’s sick,” he told him. “Just a cold.”

He stocked up on toast, yawning hugely, and retreated. It occurred to Draco that Ron had woken early and come down just to tell him that.

He almost smiled but the Shadow stayed. He sat, silent and alone, and not a sound could be heard except for the clink-clink-clink of a spoon against a bowl. 

* * *

His trembling got worse when the Gryffindor in Defence re-carved _murderer_ into his hand. Draco felt every letter as though it was being carved into his very bone.

_M U R_

His hands shook.

_D E R_

He would wait.

_E_

Slow, like a perfect summer day.

_R_

Painful, like holding a finger to a candle flame.

And he did not move. He would not flee. Something held him there, frozen and proud. Perhaps a fragment of his past, a song he once knew, a dream he half-remembered.

He did not move.

The Gryffindor met his eyes and turned away; Draco knew it would not happen again. Blood trickled from his hand onto the parchment, hot like the wind from a wildfire, and still he did not move.

* * *

These days he felt something new, trembling in the wind like a gold autumn leaf. Like a red paper heart.

Draco was waiting for something; for what, he did not know. But his hands were still now, his mind quiet, and although the Shadow came often for him he could meet it without turning his head, without casting his eyes away. He felt as though he was remembering a song. It had been waiting, caught in his throat, but now it was almost on his lips, trying to form the words, to finally make a sound and break the silence the Shadow brought.

In his hands the stillness waited; his lips waiting for song, his body keen and strung for any wind to play.

* * *

The whispers followed him but more reluctantly now. Draco kept walking, forcing himself not to slink against the wall like a mouse skulking from a predator, a fox waiting for the hunting rifle.

“The Littlest Death Eater...”

“The war’s over,” he said and the words broke through them, a ship cutting through waves. “Grow up.”

_Don’t tremble. Oh, please don’t tremble._

Be still.

And it seemed his heart obeyed too, pausing in time, his lungs refusing breath.

And they were gone, their eyes cast away, their feet shuffling hesitantly.

And he could breathe again, sharp, strange air, as though they had been taking up too much space, making him small and choking. Yes. He could move now.

* * *

He was the first to finish the Panacis Potion as they headed into summer. On the last day of February, he smiled.

“I’m finished,” he said, and he was. No rough edges now, nothing left wanting. Perhaps some hairline cracks, some shards that had somehow gone astray. But for the most part, he felt everything again. Yes, he could feel now. He could feel every muscle working beneath his skin, the sinew and bone shifting with each other. He could feel his hands, hold them still. He could hold his wand straight. He could pour ingredients — carefully, tensely — but he could.

Harry was looking into his cauldron.

“Yes,” he said, “you’re finished.”

Outside, red tulips came through the last of the snow; red hearts in an aching winter.

* * *

Spring came moodily, reluctantly, trying to breathe life back into winter’s remains, bringing unexpectedly cold mornings, bitter frosts. But there had been a spate of warm weather recently, a begrudged gift which the students enjoyed nevertheless. They roamed the grounds, circling the lake, attempting to study, lazing and stretching like cats in the heavy afternoon sun.

But the cold breeze had come up once more. Draco watched them from the castle. The wind picked up hats and played with them, tossed cloaks like toys, sent ribbons and loose parchment spiraling. A lone quill dipped and skimmed across the lake as if writing in the water.

It was a warning, a promise to the students who remained and sure enough the winds brought the chilly drizzle with them, a sunshower from half-hearted clouds. The remaining students shrieked and tumbled across the grounds, holding textbooks over heads, laughing and exclaiming, streaming across the grounds like ants, disappearing into their solid castle. And the rain deepened and sent splashes across the lake, dapples across the window. Draco liked the rain right then, at that moment. It was deep and slow and relentless, the heartbeat of nature, the lifeblood of the skies.

The song was on his lips at last. He knew it! He knew it now. Slow and perfect like a blooming rose. He could make a sound now. He could break this silence.

Yes. He knew now.

* * *

Harry was standing in the precise middle of all four tables. Trying to choose. Draco came in, his eyes bright, but Harry wasn’t looking at him. He was frowning, unable to decide where to sit today. Draco sat at the Hufflepuff table and decided that meant he should be helpful.

“You look in a Ravenclaw mood,” he offered, but Harry shook his head and took a Slytherin seat. He rested his chin in his hand and reached for the porridge although he made no move to eat it, just poke it around.

“Is the Shadow on you?” Draco asked.

“No. Not today.”

“The Shadow is with me,” Draco said and he knew Harry understood the difference without asking. The Shadow would always be with them; a quiet companion, a dark memory.

“Will you ever go back to that room?” Harry asked.

“No,” Draco replied. The room held nothing more for him. An empty room, a silent witness. He could do no more.

He took out the wand. If Harry had seen him in the room, he must have seen him pick up the wand. He held it now and his fingers shook only ever so slightly. He stood up and Harry met him in between the Slytherin and Ravenclaw tables. When he held the wand out his hand shook badly but Harry simply wrapped his hand around the wand too, helping hold it steady.

 _“Prior Incantato,”_ Draco said and it was a whisper, a thin murmur, but it rode across the hall as though an invisible wind had seized it and carried it like a leaf. Out of the wand burst a silver fox that turned and looked at them before it evaporated, loose smoke of silver curling away into the enchanted ceiling.

“Expecto Patronum,” Harry said softly.

“What?” Draco was confused. Harry turned to look at him.

 _“Expecto Patronum!”_ he called out, his voice clear across the hall like a bright long ribbon. A flash of blinding white was produced from Harry’s wand and a stag gently nudged its way out of the light, then disappeared. “It repels Dementors,” Harry explained. “But it will also fight any enemy for a brief time or send messages to other people for you — if you know how.”

“Perhaps they cast it against a Dementor?”

“In the castle? Highly unlikely.” Harry shook his head.

“Perhaps they were too weak to fight, and cast the spell to fight for them,” Draco suggested.

“If they were too weak to fight, they were too weak to produce this spell. They would have been strong, healthy, their mind clear,” Harry said.

“They used it to send a message, then,” Draco said. “They were strong and healthy and clearheaded, but they knew — thought — that they would not win. They cast it while they were still able to.” In his mind, he saw it. The empty room, the dark fight. The fox racing away — someone running back with it to help, too late — too late! In the room, the fight was quickly over, the person dying or dead, their victor gone — their friend or family member unable to assist except by comforting them in their final seconds or carrying their bloodied body away.

Draco turned away. Another story, another shadow. His strength dissipated like smoke.

“No,” Harry said quietly. “That is the Patronus of Seamus Finnigan, and he lives.”

* * *

_He lives._

He lives!

And Draco, he lived. A miracle. A war. Him and Harry at the heart of it. Him in hiding, a coward; Harry brave, walking towards his death unarmed and unafraid.

 _He was not afraid to die_ , Draco thought. _He was not afraid to die, and I was afraid to live. And when we meet_ , he thought, _when we meet again, I will show him I am not afraid to live anymore._

* * *

They met.

Harry was sitting at the Hufflepuff table.

Draco sat next to him.

“It’s raining,” Harry commented, and that was all it took for the words to tumble from Draco’s mouth.

“You’re my rain,” he said and it was that song, the right words, like hearts from a gun, the words from his lips. Not blood or shadows. Just a thousand red hearts.

Harry didn’t ask for an explanation. He just knew, and that’s what Draco loved about him.

He leaned forward and their lips met.


End file.
